A third-party metric intended to estimate how likely a website is to rank in search results relative to other websites.
It is useful for comparison but is not a ranking score used directly by Google.
Short and sweet:
A third-party metric intended to estimate how likely a website is to rank in search results relative to other websites.
It is useful for comparison but is not a ranking score used directly by Google.
See also: Backlink, Link Building, SEO
Domain authority is a third-party score, popularized by Moz, that predicts how likely a website is to rank in search results based largely on the quantity and quality of links pointing to it, though it’s important to note it’s not a metric Google itself produces or officially uses. It runs on a logarithmic scale, which means the jump from a low score to a slightly higher one is far easier to achieve than climbing the same distance near the top, where competition for links is much fiercer. Because it’s just one proxy among many, it’s best used to compare a site’s own progress over time or against direct competitors, rather than treated as a precise, absolute measure of ranking potential.
Wikipedia carries an extremely high domain authority, largely thanks to millions of backlinks accumulated over two decades, which helps its pages rank well for almost any topic imaginable.
An SEO agency pitching link building services to a new client will often check this same score in Moz first, using it to set realistic expectations for how competitive certain keywords will be.
A brand-new blog typically starts with a rating near zero on this scale, meaning it usually takes months of consistent, quality backlinks before it can meaningfully compete with more established sites.
